THE Twelfth Annual Conference /of National Organizations called by the American Association for the United Nations comes as a propitious reminder of the range and depth of this country's support of the United Nations.
     Both by its promise and by its actions, the U.N. has justified that support over the years.
     The Sixteenth Session of the General Assembly ended last month with a matchless record of solid accomplishments.
     It rejected emphatically a powerful attack against the integrity of the Secretariat and went on to a series of positive steps which are admirably summarized in the theme of your conference "The U.N. Decade of Development."
     In the course of its work the Sixteenth General Assembly adopted a set of guiding principles and agreed to the new approach to general and complete disarmament which will get under way in Geneva on Wednesday. It extended the Charter of the United Nations to outer space and established a new Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space which begins its work next week., It adopted a resolution calling for an expanded and intensified program for economic and social progress in the less developed world in the decade ahead.
     We can be proud of our initiatives and of the U.N. response in these three critical areas of disarmament, outer space, and rapid modernization of the emerging nations. If real progress can be made in these three areas, the present decade can be the most exciting and rewarding time in history.
     To sustain its present initiative as a force for peace and human progress the U.N., of course, must regain a sound and orderly financial position. The three-point financial plan approved by the General Assembly is the only proposal put forth at the U.N. or elsewhere which will meet the requirements and is the only one which has the approval of the General Assembly. The U.N. bond issue, which is the key part of the financing plan, has become the symbol and substance of support of the United Nations by its members.
     Last week Finland and Norway purchased the first of the U.N. bonds. A dozen more nations will follow shortly. The world is now watching to see whether the United States will continue to play its full part in helping the United Nations to make this a decade in which the world moves dramatically toward the peaceful and progressive world foreseen in the Charter.
     I look forward to meeting with your leaders at the White House tomorrow, and I welcome the evidence offered by your organizations that bipartisan support for the U.N. in its present financial crisis is stronger than ever. Please accept my best wishes for a most productive conference.